BIOGRAPHY

Ryu Goto has established himself as a significant voice in classical music, with a large and growing public in Asia, North America and Europe. Ryu’s career began at age seven when he made his debut at the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan, playing Paganini’s Violin Concerto No.1. Since then, Ryu has appeared as a soloist with many of the world’s leading orchestras, including National Symphony Orchestra (DC), The Philadelphia Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, London Philharmonic, Münchner Philharmoniker, Wiener Symphoniker, Frankfurt Radio Symphony, Hamburger Symphoniker, Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra, Sydney Symphony, Shanghai Symphony Orchestra and NHK Symphony Orchestra. He has worked with conductors Lorin Maazel, Tan Dun, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Fabio Luisi, Leonard Slatkin, Kent Nagano, Myung-Whun Chung, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Andrés Orozco-Estrada, and Jonathan Nott, Jaap van Zweden and Valery Gergiev. Ryu has performed in many of the world’s most prestigious venues, including Carnegie Hall, Kennedy Center, Tokyo Suntory Hall, Sydney Opera House, Shanghai Grand Theater, Taipei National Concert Hall, Vienna Musikverein, Munich’s Herkulessaal and the Philharmonic Hall Gasteig. As the highlight of 2020-2021 season, Ryu will start the Japan recital tour in November 2020 to celebrate his 25th Anniversary over 10 cities throughout Japan.

Ryu’s philanthropic work includes working with student musicians throughout the world, mentoring their development and conducting master classes in conjunction with the world’s top institutions. Efforts include the “Ryu Goto Excellence in Music Initiative Scholarship” with the NYC Department of Education, as well as collaborations with institutions such as the Juilliard School and the Harvard Bach Society Orchestra. He does extensive musical outreach in developing countries in Latin America, Southeast Asia and Africa.

In Japan Ryu’s features in media are numerous, including his own documentary “Ryu Goto’s Odyssey”, a chronicle of his career and personal life from 1996-2006. He has served as spokesperson for the East Japan Railway Company. From October 2015 to March 2017, Ryu appeared weekly on TV Asahi’s show, Untitled Concert, a nationally televised program in Japan listed in Guinness World Records as “the longest-running TV program for classical music.”

Ryu records for Deutsche Grammophon in collaboration with Universal Classics Japan. He joined the soundtrack “Fukushima 50”, the first Japanese film to directly depict the inside story of the titular group of employees tasked with handling the meltdown of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami.

In May 2011 he graduated from Harvard University with a BA in Physics.He is an Honorary Guest Professor at the Music School of Shanghai University. A member of the US-Japan Council, Ryu has been honored with an award from the Japanese American Bar Association as a Japanese-American leader. Alongside the performance activities, in addition to the international cultural exchanges, educational and community engagement activities in the world, he has been very active as a karate player and an entrepreneur. He holds a 3rd degree black belt from the Japan Karate Association, and is fluent in multiple languages including English, Japanese, French and Chinese. Ryu performs on the Stradivarius 1722 violin “Jupiter” on loan to him from Nippon Music Foundation.

＠March 2020
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